 end of the line Yeah, this is Jade in the eastern Mediterranean area, and this is Preliminary study, we're still working progress and Here you see some of these axes from the eastern Mediterranean in the middle. There's one of them. So we know they're there We just heard about the study of Pierre and Marie Petra and their team and about the Western European cluster of Jedi type axes and Yeah, here you see the two sources of Montevisu and big way and you see some of the the Jedi type up there, but Pierre also worked on another area in the eastern Mediterranean, which he was very interested in and which I also was Interested in so we joined forces in asking the question. What about Jedi type in the eastern Mediterranean? now Pierre and his team have already done studies in In the Bulgarian area and Romanian area where they saw Italian Jedi type Axis being Exported or traded through a network from Western European area to the Eastern European area So especially from the Varna Burials, there are Jedi type axes from the Italian Alps Now the question is then what about yeah the Eastern Mediterranean could we find something there? Now one of the places that we concentrated on was Syros because we know that from old Geological studies that there are sources there and they look like this and they actually look like a lot like the Jedi type in the Italian Alps as well visually. There's almost no difference. Maybe they're a little bit Lighter in the color, but yeah, so there are some sources there And then there's near the Bursa area. There's pink Jade Jedi type. I Haven't seen many axes of pink. I've seen one, but that's it and Then we have Further east in the Sokhan region in Iran. We have the blue Jedi type. So these are the ones that we from Geological surveys already know about. So Pia went first to pick up Geological samples of of the of the Jedi type on Syros and and then The team that I was working in we went there a little bit after in the footstep of Pia and Marie-Pétricade And the area that we were focusing on was in the northern part in the campus Valley, it's a known site and that's where the stuff is lying all the way It's very it's very concentrated exactly in that valley It's been studied by many geologists, but no archaeologists have been there before so So you could see these larger boulders on Syros or of Jedi type and Through studies in the Italian Alps Pia and Marie had done experiments where they Nabbing off big lumps of Jedi type is very difficult So they had this hypothesis that they burned They had a fireplace near the bigger boulders and then you can knock off larger pieces Which you can then produce preforms and then data access of so that means that around the boulders if that hypothesis is right then there should be flakes lying around and Ideally also a charcoal underneath which could be dated and that's actually what you found here and Marie-Pétricade in In the sources in the Italian Alps Now the question is then could we see the same on the Syros around the Syros boulders? And we could see there was pottery there which looked neolithic And we could see flakes lying around So there must have been some sort of production But of course the next step will then be to See if we can find some charcoal and actually Date the stuff, but that's something for the future but it definitely has potential as one of the places of being Yeah, one of the few carrying places or sites that we've seen of Jedi type anyway in the Aegean Here you see some of the Syros Jedi type this different Um They looked a little bit different from the lighter ones and then to the darker ones and these are unpolished and then when you polish them They look a little bit different here. You can see On the right hand side the polished ones and then on the left hand side the unpolished ones And of course when you then look at access in archaeological context, they look differently again because They have a pattern that so It's not one-to-one always Some of the challenges and the prominences when you look at the Italian ones and the ones from Syros And you look at in the microscope. It's very difficult to see difference so um Because if there's Italian access made of Jedi type from Italy found in Bulgaria and Romania Then there might be some found in Um in the Aegean as well And how to distinguish that from the Syros one that that was uh, that's a challenge When looking at the access you can see some differences visually um, some of the ones that from visually and also studied by radio spectrometry by Missa Lerera and Piappertanami We could see that some of them The ones that you see on the left hand side that could originate from the Italian Alps One special feature is these larger fills bar in it. That's not a feature that we will see in the Syros access or access which you see then here on your right hand side So there might be some differences, but again the pattern might might also be problematic So this is what I was telling about. We were doing this spectral radio radiometry Made by Missa Lerera and Piappertanami And these are geological samples on the top Where you see geological samples from Syros and you can see on the spectra that it has different signals And that means that in the mineral the mineral composition might be different so What you were talking about was umphicyte Jadotides might be the case here or maybe some more albide in more glycophane The mineral composition definitely different Then when you see on the axis found in the axis from Bulgaria, you see not as many Differences in the spectra. That means that that could be more or less pure jadotide or less a different level of albide albide and glycophane and all these other minerals so differences in the Syros and At least the one found in Bulgaria these axis here We also tried in Copenhagen with Tonsi Baguciunic to do x-ray diffraction on the Syros samples And there we confirmed the things that we saw in the spectrometry It actually has more feldspar and albide and glycophane in it And then we took some we did the same analysis on some of the ones found on the cyclides this axis here Which we thought could be alpine and you can see it's almost pure jadotide So it's with two different methods. We could see the same The same they gave the same result anyway, so But that corresponds with With these methods that we've been using we're trying to use multiple Methods and a multiple approach in order to gain further in this in this pronence Challenges, let me say that we have Here we have another example of a Syros sample geological sample on the top where you also see the same A feldspar albide and glycophane and different kinds of minerals and then we took one of the axes found in northern Greece We could see the same signal with different kinds of Of feldspar and albide in it. So it has a different more variable mineral composition Corresponding to the Syros material, of course, it's not one to one, but Uh, this signals that it might be from one of the more local sources in the gene So the next step that we've been looking at is a Laser basin deductible its ICP mass spectrometry where we could see differences between the italian sources Below and then the the syros sources Especially when looking at trace signals of cesium lead and european And then Yeah, you could see them here the difference So the syros actually have a higher degree of cesium lead and european compared to the mount viso And this is a study by harlow. Of course, then i mean harlow He probably did maybe five samples We should do much more samples in order to see the variation As and also showed in the caribbean and we actually did that Here you can see the syros samples and you can see we can still see the difference in the compared to the syros Material in the cesium and lead, but the ropium is more a little bit. That's more overlapping So that might be a place to move forward with the actual axis These are only made on the diorologo studies But of course we have to have more samples also from the italian helps in order to verify this the future step that we're working on is A uranium lead dating by Sem analysis that we can see that that remetamorphosized of these Metamorphosized rock They tend to date in different phases. George harlow already published that But we are trying to do that with german lead dating of circum and here you can see The ax here and where we actually Even if they're polished we can see the circum That's the pink dots there and there we can actually date it and we actually dated some of the diorologo stuff And that corresponds to the to the dating that George harlow had that the syros dates around 80 to 40 A million years ago, whereas a month visa lies in a total different scale of 150 to 160 million years ago. So that might be a future step to move forward in order to prominence it of course these are Destructive methods, but they only leave a small mark like it's not a bigger mark, but it's difficult for us because it's not portable That's the challenge with these things that the the icp is destructive And it's not probable portable and In order to fit in the machine There's a limit sizes of access. So it has to be below 10 centimeters Well, actually most of the access in the gene is actually below 10 centimeters. That's a good thing They don't have to be too thick and it's very expensive. So we're really struggling there So what Alice was suggesting with the portable laser That might be something for the future. I mean that that's potentially a big breakthrough We're pleased about your your good results there and maybe when you can When you can persuade the american museums to do it, maybe we might be able to do the same In the agn and eastern med serenium. Well, who knows? But anyway, what we were then dealing with in is maybe combining some of the destructive methods with the non-destructive and then Kind of do some sort of protocol of how we should do it So we might be able to take some with the destructive analysis And then do the same test on the non-destructive and see if we can calibrate it in some way But it's really important for us to do or have some sort of mobile method Alternative otherwise, it's really difficult for us And one of the things that we've been looking at is this raman spectrometry together with the sem or your portable Solution there We will have to talk about that later. So when we look at the visual things we can definitely see when we compare with the axle with the actual With the actual sources. We see different sites where it's very clear. It's jadeiteite And and and it it points towards the the cirrus things or A surprise though is I told you about the bursa You remember the bursa the pink jadeiteite? Well, we had a meeting in the summer together with the geologist who who published that source first His name is al-okai. So he showed me a pink one The pink jadeiteite, which I've only seen one acts of but then he showed me another one Which is very similar to that thing which looks like the cirrus thing or some of the things that you find in italian ounce this very This color here kind of thing And we had it analyzed by x-ray diffraction and luckily it had a huge amount of quartz in it So 25 percent. So it's definitely different But that's only one sample, but it's different from the things that we've seen so far by x-ray diffraction in the cirrus Area and in the italian alps So luckily for that, but we need more samples. It's just to say we we don't know all the sources It's it's it's still coming out then the more people are looking at it Not only archaeologists, but especially geologists can go through areas But they don't find it because they're not looking for it So that's really a challenge And now here you have jucurici hayak where we have Clear dates of where these things are found in so these two are actually samples of access that I was allowed To nap off that's very rare I'm allowed to do that and you can compare that with some of the cirrus material and it's very clear that it looks the same Unfortunately, there was a coup in turkey So the samples are still in turkey and I'm waiting to get them out of the country so we can analyze them So something for the future there again, but it's very clear that they they they look very alike and they're dated the earliest layers from early neolithic from 6800 to 6500 really really early. So the first Farming communities coming in they start exploiting obsidian, but they also start exploiting these These excess air together with a lot of other raw materials, but also the jedi tide and then until the early bronze age around Early third millennium. We also see excess air. So we have the whole series of exploitation just on one side And here you see some of the excess that could possibly be from cirrus When you see some of them and some of them could be of visor and big one And then we have some unknown where we simply don't know where they're from And if you look at the distribution well, you actually cover most of the Vagian area and and also the date from 7th millennium until The early Bronze Age That's what we've seen so far And we are actually surprised our surprise to see that these the exchange of these jedi tide access Actually continues further east. So we also see something in the kaiseri area We've seen in the kapdosian area. We've seen in the adzio area and this Thing here is actually found in sakala in egypt From our collection and we've done x-ray defects analysis. So we know it's it's jedi tide so They're actually coming in the whole eastern Mediterranean area and I think this might be only top of the iceberg And this is only the jedi tide Story, there's also a nephrite story. There's a huge variety of nephrite in the area And the nephrite is also used as as as pendants as these frogs Which is concentrated in the northern southern Southern bulgarian area and uber slavia and northern agian area you have these pendants made of nephrite But you also see in the area Actually more numbers of access and access of nephrite in it, but we don't know any of the sources They are known. We don't know them So that's something for the future as well Whereas the access of the jedi tide in this area is mostly Access and and and almost none of them is made out of any pendants or anything like that So how did these italian ones come in because If there was an exploitation of jedi tide services on sewers already from the 7th millennium Then they're the earliest ones that we know In the mediterranean area much before the ones that I exploited in the big one visu area So how did the ones come the italian ones? How did they end up in the agian area? Well, we think that there must have been some sort of of exchange networks between the northern part of The bulgarian and romanian area and the agian areas and the way we see this is that There might have been some exchange of the alpine axis and nephrite axis copper axis gold objects honey flint and possibly also obsidian from this part of area going down to the agian And then what return could have been obsidian going up But also maybe sewers jedi tide in the axis of the bulgaria marble wasis and spontaneous objects pendants So doing the 5th millennium with the copper age. There might have been more interaction and And networks between these areas, which we are only trying to understand right now So what new knowledge can be gained of these plenmonary studies, which we have to go in deeper to? Well, we know for sure now that human egg partition of jedi tide in the eastern mediterranean Appeared and we have the nephrite and jedi tide and But the scale of it is still unknown. So when we look at the assemblage, we might be able to find one To five jedi tide axis. So they're very Exotic in the assemblage in general Whereas there might be 10 percent or more Or 10 to 15 percent of nephrite at least in the one that I've been seeing So they're more common in these sites here, but they're still very limited Most of it is hematite or basalt or more local ones But are they local ones? We don't know because they've been really selective about it. They're all Really fine materials. So there's this whole thing about the local stuff as well, which I haven't gone into But I have some numbers of it. So and then we see signs of seafaring and Inland agrarian network when the first farmers settled in Western Anatolia where they start or begin to exploit obsidian They knew that we know that from analysis that especially the milers obsidian they're exploiting and on the way to milers Well, they will stop or like other geo geological Spectators to try to find the best material wherever they can and this might be the places where we can see these So these places these querying sites are actually meeting places where you can expect to see people And then what happens at meeting places? Well, there might be free access. There might be interaction and it might be craving the The the first ideas of being civilized to each other not just rob each other and steal from each other Which I think is a very interesting idea And then the alpine connection with the alpine geolitex access in in the agian area Well, that might be exchange network from from From the west to the east in connects the with the introduction of copper in the copper age Because it begins up there in the Bulgarian area with with sources and and in that connection there might be Network connections further to the south as well And I'm sure if you look at more pottery and more proxies of examples One could find more examples of this exchange network at that time And then in conclusion with the date We can see that they probably continued to exchange The state ititex but also a net right from the seventh until third millennium in a huge network Goes beyond the agian and western Anatolian area But possibly covering the whole eastern Mediterranean region and perhaps beyond I mean there are areas in in places in Syria and Iran we can't visit right now But I'm sure that if we if we look at other samples in Europe where where they have material from this we will find Exotics like these but again The sources in this area is also very Very preliminary. So sewers may be a stone age hop in the in the Neolithic and Bronze Age and Of course, no man is an island I've been visiting a lot of museums and been in contact with a lot of people and without them Nothing of this could could be could happen. So Thank you very much